Artifice Page 60

So! Lots of interesting and fun reactions to Maven in the comments last time! Some of you love her and her “snark”, some of you “love to hate her” and others just want to “reach through the screen [to] sock Maven in the face”. For some, Maven is their “favorite character”; while others feel she is “an extraordinarily cliché female character [who] speaks as much to societal values as a scantily-clad bimbo would.” (Ouch.) Is Maven crazy irrational or crazy like a fox? Is she a person with “a repulsive personality and a seeming lack of motivation for her behaviour” or is she a brilliant professional choosing the most effective tactics against a challenging and hostile interrogee? Folks are picking sides and I can imagine this page will only add more fuel to that fire. 😉

I will say one thing, though—I love that you all are having this debate. Yes, Artifice is meant to be an entertaining sci-fi story first. But one thing that has always impressed me with our readers is the thoughtful responses to this work you all have—both to what’s happening to the characters in my world and to the larger implications of my choices as a creator in the world we live in. Be it a discussion about whether homosexuality could be determined purely through genetics (and the ethical ramifications of that) or the role of women as antagonists in comics, I can always count on you to offer really enlightening thoughts on the matter. It’s one of the coolest things about putting this comic out there. And I thank you for it. 🙂

In other news, have some gorgeous new Fan Art by Hayley Dubay, “Two Wings Equals One Set”. It’s Deacon and Jeff entwined in a nearly mystical fashion. You owe it to yourself to check it out. Thanks, Hayley!

And…

***THIS IS A BONUS PAGE!***

The 14th in a row! Woo hoo!

Special thanks go out to long-time supporters Sue T., Brian d., Erin H. & Micheal B. (who has now donated for the 16th week in a row! My hero!) and a warm welcome and grateful bow goes out to new supporter Victoria G. for their generous donations over the last few days.

Big hugs go out to long-time friends of Artifice Megan D. and Meagan S. for their super-generous $25 donations! (Made just three minutes apart! O_O)

(Also, extra big high-fives for Megan, Meagan and Victoria for putting us well over the top for this bonus page! You rock!)

Your generosity is truly humbling and has been a huge morale booster during a rather crazy time for me. Thank you all so much!

So… will Maven finally get the answers she (and we!) have been craving about what exactly happened with Deacon and the retrieval team? Tune in this Saturday to find out! 😀

If you particularly enjoy any of these pages and use Facebook, please click the Like button on that page. It’s useful to know what’s working and it helps me get the word out!

Ah, it’s true that I usually do update the Fan Art page first. It just took a little longer to prep the Fan Art image file and I didn’t want to delay the page update while I fussed with that. 🙂

Aikka

XD

But you scared me by that. I knew that there is fanart to post today [saw it already earlier ^^], and i knew that it appears first, so when i saw there is no fanart, i thought the update will be delayed! o..o

geneticsgirl

first to comment and i cannot wait for saturday. I wonder if the retrieval team will barge in on the sweet lovers. …

Aikka

I was first ha! XD

crimsonkiss22

She went all alpha-numeric on you, Deacon. I assume that’s the equivalent of a very angry parent shouting out a child’s first and middle names.

I can’t say I hate Dr. Maven, but I can say that I’d like to know more about her position within the company and the primary goal she wishes to achieve by interrogating Deacon. What are the answers she’s looking for? What will she do with those answers? Who will she share them with? What will happen to Deacon when this interrogation is over? Etc, so on and so forth.

At this point, it almost feels as if she’s fulfilling a personal curiosity about Deacon and Jeff’s relationship while doing her job at the same time. I say this because of her short fuse and fiery temper (then again, it could just be her personality). I find it difficult to believe she doesn’t have any personal interest in this despite the fact that it is her job to ask questions; however, how much of the question-asking is for her own benefit? (In what way, shape or form is left to be discovered, obviously) Or maybe she really, really, really hates to beat around the bush. *shrug*

I am still entirely skeptical, if that wasn’t already apparent, and thoroughly intrigued by Dr. Maven’s furious reactions. The bottom line is what I cannot wait to get to, but I must be patient!

LOL. So lol. Love the scared shitless Deacon face. It endears me so much how he can be all superior intellect and all and yet he’s intimidated by Maven like a caught-in-the-act schoolboy before the principal.

Maven is amazing on this page. Nice to see her feathers ruffled, it gives me insight into her character. She’s the type of person who would say an entire person’s name when mad at them, such as her calling deacon by (i presume to be his) model number. She can also say complex words when angry and shouting, which is important to know.

in all honesty, i think Maven could calm down just a tad bit… just a tad… lol Deacon freaked the eff out when she jumped out of her chair. i think i’d freak the eff out too!! XD like a cat. i’d prolly jump 15 feet in the air in surprise cuz of her yelling lmao. i mean you’d think she’d figure out that yelling at him isnt exactly getting her much information, so whether she yells or not i think she’ll be getting the same answers. ^^; he’s only answering truthfully, though hesitantly. hhahaaa still deacon’s “holy shiet” face is great. and yes that is indeedly a lovely moon. 😀 lol

Honestly, I think the yelling is getting Maven better results than being calm would. The thing is, Deacon IS like a a child in a lot of ways. Certainly, he’s got the programming to BS his way around Maven’s questions, when she’s calm. As soon as she starts yelling and getting in his face, I think she startles him out of his typical way of thinking. For a lot of us, we might freeze and clam up or get angry and yell at her for being treated that way, but Deacon doesn’t seem to have life experience. As far as I can tell, Deacon MIGHT have 10 years of experience as a soldier, if that. I’m thinking the angry yelling people Deacon usually deals with, he can cause them enough harm that they back down, or kill them, because he was sent for that purpose. He literally CAN’T do that to Maven, because of his programming, and he doesn’t have the capability to rebel, like a kid would do, because of his programming. That leaves him completely out of options, so he does what any kid would do when they can’t disobey and they don’t WANT to obey: He shrinks away and gives in and hopes it will STOP.

As for Maven, I don’t think she’s a bitch at all. From what I can tell, in Maven’s head, she’s talking to a weapon. I don’t think she thinks of Deacon as a person the way she’d think of one of us as a person. So I think that, to her, she’s basically using the most aggressive and effective tactics in her arsenal, because she’s got a captive subject, who will never try to cause her physical harm and who “can’t” be mentally scarred by any tactics she might try to use.

OMFG, Deacon’s only 3 years old?! No WONDER he freaks out when Maven starts yelling at him! Wow, that is…wow. *snerk* Jeff’s a pedo.

mikakitten

Eeek!! It looks like she might slap Deacon!! Please don’t do it Maven!! He’s only a curious robot boy! 🙁 don’t punish him!! He killed them because he loves Jeff!! LOVES!!! I hope the next scene isn’t a sad one!! We can’t have tears for christmas (has a terrible imagining of Deacon and Jeff being torn apart from an embrace) Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!! ;_;

KBatty

See, as much as I hate Maven… part of me would really like to see her smack him. Would it evoke anger? Shame? Sadness? Will it provoke an evil robot rampage or will Deacon just curl into a ball and weep? Or… simulate weeping. lol

AnyOtaku

I feel bad for Decon, but Marvels reactiom is just so hilarious! Love it! Btw, you said this comic would have like XXX pages right? I know it’s quite far but I’m sure that I will miss it when it ends T_T wednesdays and satirdays won’t be the same…

Because I’m a spoiler-phobic nutball, I’m looking to keep the exact page count out of the comments (and the final page count has changed just slightly), but yes, I did say that. 🙂 I’m really glad that you’ve been enjoying Artifice. And… I might have another webcomic in the works to fill those days when Artifice finishes up. One I hope you’ll stick around for. 🙂

AnyOtaku

Really? Because that would be wonderful! Like a dream come true =D I’m sure it’s going to be awesome too

KBatty

Hahaha Alex. <3 Oh lordy. of everything I've said since the comic started, of course THAT would be the thing you latch onto for conversation's sake. You devil. 😉

In this page I was completely expecting Maven to haul off and smack a bitch. Yeah Deacon, I called you a bitch. Please don't do to m what you did to the retrieval team. I want to liiiive.

Heh, that comment was quite provocative—and still seems to be sparking discussion on the previous page, so it seemed like a good choice to represent one of the contrasting views regarding the good doctor. 🙂

Hmm, Maven… I’ll come out of lurking to say this. I think that Maven IS a professional. And I think that contrary to what she’s saying here, she is at least interested in Deacon as an anomaly, even if she isn’t willing to put up with his bullshit. I think she’s the type of person to be curious about anything that isn’t normal, and why would a psychiatrist be in that field otherwise?

I also think that she knows her stuff, and is familiar with resistant patients and is therefore using a variety of techniques in order to extract the truth. I think the truth matters to her not just because her job is to reveal it, but also because it’s intriguing to discover that an artificial person can develop emotions. If she ends up believing him, that is.

That’s just my observation. I don’t think she’s being intentionally malicious, and it’s almost nice to see Deacon, who is accustomed to being in control of the fates of others, being controlled. It DOES almost make him seem….human, the way he cringes at her anger and feels hand-wringing unease about her probing.

I greatly look forward to seeing how they may explain this evolution of artificial intelligence into true intelligence.

yaoikitty

Very nicely put! And I just wanna say that I also love Trance as much as I love Artifice!

Very thoughtful and interesting analysis, Trance Comic. (And yes, I agree, it is in these moments with Maven that Deacon often does seem the most human.)

wasEnkidu

I think the truth matters to her as a therapist as well. A lot of therapy is getting the patient to examine themselves and reach conclusions that they would not have realized about themselves without an outside observer offering them a neutral point of view. If she were to ask Deacon to take a step back and view the situation he got himself into as if it were a case file on someone else, would he still insist that the android in that situation was a good soldier? If it were a case where he had no personal stake in the outcome, how would he view his own actions?

C K

Oh man, I feel for Deacon here. The scene makes Deacon seem like a small, easily-flustered kid while Maven is his angry mother.

That said, while I’m certainly on Team Deacon + Jeff Living Together in Coital/Post-Coital Bliss For Eternity, I can’t say I really blame Maven for what she’s doing. If you get into her mindset, she sees someone (or some*thing*?) breaking all the rules for a foolish, unprofessional, and self-serving reason. And, even worse, killing off seven people in the process. If your goal is “complete the task at hand” and “do what is best for the company”, then Deacon’s actions would look wildly irresponsible.

But enough of my rambling! As usual, excellent comic, and I am on the edge of my seat waiting for more — I desperately want to know what happened with the retrieval team.

It looks like she’s going to slap him… but then she doesn’t. I wonder if she just never was, or if she decided that hitting a face that wasn’t quite made of flesh and bone might break her hand.

wasEnkidu

I think that like a cat puffing up, she is just doing it to intimidate Deacon. Like threatening a kid with a spanking. (I myself was a BRAT. I threw tantrums in the way a hurricane can be called “a rainstorm”. Spanking was the only effective threat against me. :P)

fujoshifanatic

It is indeed interesting to see all these opinions about Maven — truth be told, I enjoy reading the comments here as much as I enjoy each new page — and all the various perspectives often add insight to my assessment of Deacon and Maven’s interactions.

First and foremost, I believe that Dr. Maven has proven her consummate skill as a scientist by her ability to assess the situation as she obtains more information from Deacon, and adapt her approach to him in order to achieve the results she is seeking from this “therapy session” — determine the cause of his “malfunction,” i.e., the apparent development of his autonomy through thought and action as a result of his emotional intelligence programming, despite a supposed overriding command to obey orders from the company and not lie.

It’s obvious that she is intrigued by this development in Deacon, but first and foremost she will perform the job she has been tasked to do, which is to extract as much “non-downloadable” information about this unit’s motives as possible, then determine if it can be salvaged through reprogramming or needs to be…taken offline and examined further so as not to recreate the same malfunction.

What makes Maven the best person for the job is that she is aware of Deacon’s unique situation, and has the skills to exploit it as necessary. Despite appearances, I remember reading previously in the comments that Deacon is in fact chronologically (from production to now) about three years old. Assuming his emotional anomaly developed from the time he was “born,” and was designed to emulate human emotional development, mentally Deacon has the emotions and reactions of a three year old.

If you look back on the story, this explains a lot. Deacon’s direct, blunt mannerisms. The snap decision to keep Jeff alive rather than killing him when he was no longer necessary. The less than suave way he befriended, then seduced Jeff. And later, his awkward and anguished love confession (how many times have you heard a toddler refer to a loved one as “my mommy,” or “my Bobby?”). Even the seemingly smug demeanor he originally displayed with Maven at the start of their session and the way he tells the “truth” as he sees it mirrors that of an intelligent child who is overconfident in his ability to “fool” his elders, and quickly devolves into a typical child’s nervous fear as Maven asserts her “parental” authority (remember when your parents would use your full/proper name when they had just about had it with you?) by not taking his bullshit half-truths.

Being the godmother to a precocious and feisty three year old myself, I see all the parallels, and they fit quite nicely (well done Alex if this was your intention!). I believe Maven sees them too, and is exploiting the deficiencies in a person that emotionally young in order to get the information she needs. How this bodes for the story I will just have to see; I now what “should” happen for an honest and believable story to be told, but I am also hoping to continue to be thrown for a loop I hadn’t anticipated in the storyline. Either way, I am perfectly satisfied with the ride that I have been on so far, and while I’m not looking forward to the end (no more Artifice D-:), I will have definitely enjoyed the journey, wherever it has taken, or will continue to take me. 🙂

Maven: “You know what we do to prisoners who don’t cooperate? We hook zem up to ze box.” Deacon: “What eze ze box?” Oooooh the suspense! 🙂

Darby Roorda

OHMIGOD! For a second I thought that Maven was about to smack Deacon across the face, and I was about to get really, really mad. I like Maven to a point, despite her inability to remain professional (I know you’re frustrated Maven, but come on, step outside, take a deep breath, and remain civil.) What Maven should already know is that they tried to make an emotionless soldier and they failed. Now take Deacon and Jeff, drop them back off on that planet, and leave them alone together.

thisboybroken

The look of terror on Deacon’s face makes me want to hug him and let him know everything is going to be ok. I think Maven should go the way of the retrieval team as well, just saying! Poor little Deacon.

wasEnkidu

I like how the more Maven shows up, the more she polarizes people. There are essentially two camps and they are now: Maven fanclub I want to have her babies and I’m a woman! 8D And Maven is evil witch and must die a thousand deaths! D:<

I'll willingly and gladly admit to being one of the former, as a charter member of the Maven fanclub. But it bothers me when readers call her an evil cock-blocking woman or bring her gender into things. Like part of the reason she's bad is because she's a woman getting in the way of two men. I wonder what the feelings would be if Alex HAD written her as a male psychiatrist instead?

qu_gon_robot

Sparks would fly, people in BDSM gear would spring out of nowhere, a threesome would ensue! The law of slash is absolute! >:D

danigirl921

I just want to hug Deacon and protect him from the scary looking Maven.

Mr Nohbodee

Maven= Best detective ever.

Jacqi Smith

I think deacon’s being pretty annoying about this, I mean, i don’t see why he can’t just give her straight answers. But despite that, I think maven’s overreacting. she could clearly have just taken “you wouldn’t have been able to interrogate jeff..” as “I wanted to protect jeff.” but instead she just freaks out!

wasEnkidu

She needs him to actually say it. That whole “keeping him alive for interogation purposes” is pure grade A horseshit and she knows it. If that was his intention than he wouldn’t have been so honestly surprised when he found that they kept Jeff alive for interrogations. He did it only because his feelings for Jeff were so strong that he was willing to turn traitor to protect him. But that’s why Deacon isn’t coming out and saying it. He essentially defected to protect an enemy whom he’d fallen in love with. Not precisely ‘good soldier’ behavior in ANY military.

iamlingy

Mannnnn in that second panel she’s just got this face like she’s thinking “Boy you a stanky ass baka ho” and he’s all “WEH WEH I DON’T KNOW HOW TO FEELINGS” and I kinda wanna just squish his face because it looks really babyish and adorkable. I wanna squish both their faces because hot damn those are some skillfully drawn expressions.

wasEnkidu

FEELINGS DO NOT COMPUTE! TT_TT

krissdevalnor

I think she is desperately trying to get to the bottom of the case, but is losing her patience for real. Her outbursts are very natural imo (for a person with bad temper – like me) and it seems to be the only way to reach Deacon and keep him honest.

Like the page 😀 But I’m looking forward to when the scene will switch back to JeffxDeacon <3

It seems she just wants him to say the truth, that he was protecting Jeff.. like I don’t know the full story, only from the pieces from their convo I have put together that is the reason for Deacon’s actions.

Truly part of me hates Maven, but then again I was thinking about it and as a bisexual woman and if I watched her character unfold in a movie I would probably fall in love with her strong attitude and placement in all of this. I dunno what I’m saying, guess I’m torn. She’s stubborn and beautiful, a lot like myself.. she’s smart and knows what she wants. Her mind is a puzzle and I want to sit her down and interrogate her myself lmao! ;D

Sequinn

Wow, looks like Mavin is about to launch a slap at Deacon in panel 5! I for one like Mavin, every good adventure story needs a villain, and besides that, she grounds the story.

Lithekitty

I personally love her. She’s got a lot of spunk. I get the feeling that she may be more interested in finding out what made him different then the other machines rather then trying to fix a malfunction.

wasEnkidu

She’s a psychologist. It would be in her nature to want to know what makes him tick. If she was more interested in fixing machines she would be in IT.

Jesus stop making me love Maven! Look at that panel! She was almost bitchslapping Deacon! Oh my I’m so in love with her! Dr Maven, I’ll marry you if you weren’t, ya know, bi-dimensional. And fictional. But my love stays true.

::looks side to side, clears throat:: MAVEN SMAAAAAAAASH! Did she just LEAP at him out of her chair?!

(serious now) Wow. This is quite the development! Now we know what Deacon’s designation is; I get the feeling that Deacon’s innocent obstinacy has pushed her into attempting to dehumanize him further. She’s trying to get him to lose his cool and intimidate him into answering, which is kind of funny since earlier on in the story, he was trying to play cool himself and avoid answering her.

Such stunning facial expressions! As always, I am blown away. This comic’s art and story are one of the lights of my life 🙂

wasEnkidu

OHGOD Deacon in panel three!!! <3 :[ You are in the deepest of deep shit now sonny. She used your full name. Well, your serial number, but I have to assume that’s the equivalent of your mom busting out your middle name when calling you. >.< Brrrr!

When Maven’s expression changes to anything resembling that of panel two, I just love her to pieces. I get the feeling that Deacon is so incredibly interesting to her. Hell, I’m sitting here wanting to pick him apart, myself, so it wouldn’t surprise me. I’m sure we’ll see some interesting developments on her part yet.

wasEnkidu

I love that panel as well, but she’s got “Same old song and dance” stuck in my head now. *shakes fist*

Hahahahhaaha!! This is seriously the kind of humour you would NOT except in a gay sci-fi comic. Oh God, hilarious! So angry, so scary and then there’s Deacon, so frightened, so shocked. He keeps getting surprised every time! It’s because he doesn’t know when he’s giving the wrong answer, lol. Great job, guys. Love this comic.

MegumiSagara

i am scared of that women D:

ithilloke

That close- up of her is SO scary! O_o And that’s supposed to be professional behaviour?!?

I like her, I just think she’s a little too emotional to be a therapist. She seems to get a big angry yelling face a lot, it’s very exaggerated. Seems a bit like an overreaction to me, I guess I’m having trouble believe her character when she gets up and dances around in frustration like that. Like, seriously, hair flying in her face like he was a little nephew she hated who just smashed something priceless. I would find his motivations more intriguing from a scientific standpoint than annoying because he went against programming.

I think she’s being as antagonistic as she is to force Deacon to tell the truth. Obviously if this were a normal therapy session, Deacon could probably lead her on that “song and dance routine” for a long long while instead of telling the truth. But by keeping him on his toes and scaring him (and the rest of us, geez!! XD) she’s forcing him to be blatantly honest with her.

….I think she’s a very cunning woman. And I love her <3

leorising

I’m amazed that Maven has the sheer brass ones to raise her hand in threat to a being who apparently killed several members of his retrieval team. Or is she just stupid? *sighs in exasperation*

tom1988

Ahh D3763, you look like an innocent baby, fresh from the production facility. Those (panels 3 and 4) are the most tear jerking pictures we’ve seen of him. It’s painful to watch Deacon’s juvenile responses, naively hoping she’ll buy his reiteration that he was just doing his job. That childish manner in which he holds his hand for comfort… I’m glad this scene is moving on because I might start crying otherwise.

‘Is she a person with “a repulsive personality and a seeming lack of motivation for her behaviour” or is she a brilliant professional choosing the most effective tactics against a challenging and hostile interrogee?’

I’m not going to jump on the she’s-a-bitch train so hastily. The retrival team were presumably human (can’t remember) and it’s possibly riled her up that a “machine” decided to “break the 1st Law”, the greatest sin, murder. If you met her in another situation you might not recognise her.

Whether Maven’s aggressive attitude is the best strategy for dealing with him, that’s another question. Michel Thomas famously managed to extract vital information from high ranking Nazi war criminals without ever resorting to violence, a line she appears to be delicately treading. Maybe she could improve her interrogation skills. Maybe not.

When Maven said she was a therapist, she likely was soft-pedalling her actual role in the company, which would be better approximated by the word ‘interrogator.’ She’s an interrogator with a Ph’d, but she’s still an interrogator.

Would all these people on here be saying she’s ‘too emotional’ if she was a man dishing out a furious debriefing to a traitorous soldier?

sigsilly

Yeah, I’d hate it if all she did was yell no matter what her gender was. It’s very two-dimensional. It’s not the “too” of the emotion – it’s the fact that she seems to only have one.

ayumi hamano

I would personally feel the same way if she was a man and acted this way. Even an interigator would be trying different tactics, keeping the traitorous soldier on his toes as it were. This “oh, I’m not getting the answer I want so I’m gonna blow up at the soldier” is getting annoying and personally is pissing me off. I don’t know about D3763 but if someone continued to yell at me like that I wouldn’t be bowing down, mind you that could also be because I am not a soldier and could never follow authority very well.

Michael Bowman

She hasn’t had multiple blow outs like this, though. Yes, she’s shown strong feelings on several occasions, but she was willing to let things flow in the beginning. This blow up is, in my opinion, due to the act that Deacon has been dancing and tip-toeing around the truthful answers to all of her questions. And the truth is that she just doesn’t give a damn why he thinks his actions are justified. She wants to know why he did what he did without pretty sentiments, and thus far, that’s most of what he’s given her. Furthermore, Deacon is not just a soldier, he is a machine. I love him and all, but lets call a spade what it is. He has not only been ordered to answer all of her questions truthfully, but without any attempts to obfuscate the facts concerning said truth. Also, she is discovering some shocking thing about his recent experiences which could prove to have a major impact on this company and, I’m guessing, their world as a whole. So I think I can forgive her for a few dozen blow outs, should she have them. lol

And honestly, in most movies with interrogation scenes, there is always at least one huge emotional blow out on the part of the interrogator. Particularly if both the interrogator and ‘interrogatee’ are males. That’s just what I have scene. Otherwise, you’d have no action and no strong feeling either way about said scene.

llbutters

I think Maven’s doing her job well. She’s manipulating Deacon with her emotions to get him to explain the reasons behind his actions, and it seems to be working.

And besides, if you aren’t passionate about your job, why would you do it?

sigsilly

I really don’t like Maven. All she does is yell. She asks a question, and then she yells. It’s like she has one emotional state only. I can’t figure out if she thinks she’s his therapist, his interrogator, or his mom. It would be nice to see her exhibit an emotion other than anger.

sigsilly

… besides, therapists tried the tactic of yelling at people back in the 1970s and it clearly didn’t work then. If she’s a therapist, she’s a terrible one. If she’s an interrogator, then Deacon’s working for a government that’s very comfortable with lies and unethical behavior, so why are they so pissy about his??

Sarah Fry

I feel like Maven must have gotten her training dealing with robots, not humans. Her tactics would be all wrong, whether she’s trying to give Deacon therapy or interrogate him, if she were dealing with a human. Either way, one must develop a sympathetic/empathetic bond with the subject. Perhaps, however, since robots do not generally do this, her tactics are spot on.

Currently, I feel like this whole thing might have been a test to see what happens when you try to give robots emotions and that Maven’s actions are meant to provoke as part of this test.

YangYueLan

I think this is the only web comic I read that consistently gets essays as comments. This is a good thing.

Kittery Brazelton

Oh,,, I love this comic so much!! … That is all =D

Whitewingtip

clipboard is still gone… but she’s a ninja. IT ALL MAKES SENSE.

xenie

Great page – except I feel bad because my first thought was: “I can almost see up Maven’s skirt!” lol

I’ve got to say this. And hopefully you get a laugh out of it as well. I work for a Bakery, and as it’s the day before Christmas eve, things are beyond crazy, and on more then one occasion this week I have wanted to blow the place up, much like on page 15 LOL. But I digress. I happen to find your comic last night after another long day at work, and forced myself to stay up and read all 60 pages. At first, I was a little confused, and I just wanted my fix of man lovin. But I’m glad that I kept reading, and watching the story develop into something intense, and very different. All day today, while I worked an extended day, as well as over time, I found myself thinking back on Jeff and Deacon, and grinning from ear to ear. More then once a customer thought I was smiling because of the holidays. While I love the holidays for what they represent to me. I detest working them as a pastry decorator LOL. My co workers just thought well…LOL I wont repeat it. But, thank you for making me smile through out the day. It honestly helped me get through it more easily.

Superjenny

Yay! Someone besides me that grins like an idiot when thinking of Jeff and Deacon! ~.~

You can and shall! I think I have a crush on him ::blush:: Even if the bowtie is both cute and ridiculous. Mostly ridiculous. But also cute. I shall wave my Eccleston and Smith banner. Tennant has no need of a flag; he already knows we all adore him.

Well, at the very least, you could say that Maven is justified in her outburst. Deacon seems to have screwed up pretty badly, and has pretty much danced around the truth this entire time. I’d have to go with her being a sly fox; one way or another, she’s going to get the info she wants from Deacon.

Yaminox

I’m going to jump at the “she’s got anger issues” train. I don’t think yelling is going to get her far. for now, I’m just going to wait and remark how interesting it is that she chooses now to adress him by number. talk about othering.

I thought she was about to slap Deacon; like no bitch, you ain’t bout that life!

anime-is-awsome

i really dont think GOOD therapists are supposed to have random fits of rage at the patient…

and shouldnt she be asking the all-important question…. who was on top and who was on bottom? ;3

Chris Hartwig

Haha! exactly!

DarkFeanix21

I think Maven is almost certainly my favourite character in this comic, even if I initially only started reading for the hot guys. I’m not sure I’d trust her to treat an actual human as opposed to interrogating an android, but given the circumstances, she seems to be doing a fair job of getting Deacon to open up. She’s certainly broken him down quite a bit from the detached “inhuman” he was during the first few pages.

Jackal

Just rereading and loving the lights of the lunar colony in the background… or the giant Moon Rave or whatever’s going on…